21 July 2021
The sun is shining – every day. Even though the nights are a bit cold, the days are splendid. Maria and me always go for a walk in the morning, then I read my English books. At the moments it’s Jon Krakauer’s „Into the Wild“ which I need to finish. It matches the scenery, Alaska – Sweden, at least parts of it. But I do not feel as secluded as Chris Mc Candless alias Alexander Supertramp at all. As I have already mentioned in my last post I have not yet felt very lonely here in Sweden, even though farms and houses are widely scattered.
In the afternoon Maria and me visit some places. Yesterday it was the second of the three towns with old wooden dwellings, Nora (Eksjö, Hjo and Nora make the trio). Nora is famous for its church. The interior is kept in green and falun-red. The interior of Swedish churches is normally kept in rather whitish colours. But Nora is colourful. The silver organ highlights the place wonderfully.
Then we had ice-cream at the lake-front, the famous Nora ice-cream. The day’s flavours were vanilla and limoncello. And finally I am able to capture a jackdaw, these birds that follow you all around in a rather persistent and importunate way. I had seen lots of them in Vimmerby, it actually looked a bit scary, remembering me of Alfred Hitchcock’s „The Birds“. They would bluntly pick the seeds of your plate.
I’ve noticed by now a few times: Sweden is space, Sweden is unspoiled landscape, Sweden is where you travel back in time. For example Nora’s train station. The waggons have become a youth hostel, the ticket hall an tourist information centre.
Time stands still in Pershyttan as well. This is an open-air museum and tells the story of all the iron mining places here in Sweden. The mine was as deep as 300 meters. The iron ore was melted in the furnace and to get the high temperature you had to add air to the fire with the help of bellows. To make those work people used the about 6 meter wide blade wheel which again was put into motion by water.
